


Two Questions

by Zetared



Category: Star Trek: The Next Generation
Genre: Gen, Implied Slash
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-06-22
Updated: 2015-06-22
Packaged: 2018-04-05 14:16:44
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,728
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4182963
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Zetared/pseuds/Zetared
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Reginald Barclay spends a quiet evening with Q (with whom he has forged a strange kind of friendship, off screen). </p><p>Pre-slash if you squint, tilt your head, and have as weird a brain as I do.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Two Questions

“I have a question.”

Q glanced up from the book he’d been half-heartedly perusing for the past half hour, pleased to be distracted from the mundane task. He was more than happy to provide the Lieutenant with so-called “peace and quiet” when necessary, but the man’s personal library really had much to be desired. Q twitched a finger idly, causing several new digital books to appear on the PADD. There was a chance that Barclay would be less than pleased to find a slew of Andorian erotica and Vogon poetry in his collection, but by the time the man noticed Q would likely be long out of reach. Besides, it did the man good to branch out of his comfort zone from time to time.

“What’s the question?”

“Well, now I have two questions, actually.”

Q raised his eyebrows and sat up a bit from his sprawl on the couch, the picture of expectancy, “Go on.”

“Well. Ah. I don’t know which question to ask first, now,” Barclay admitted, looking shifty. He wasn’t stammering too much, which was a good sign, but he was pretty twitchy, and Q had learned to recognize when the officer was rapidly approaching a conversational meltdown.

“I doubt the order matters,” Q assured, “I probably won’t answer truthfully, anyway.”

This statement and the accompanying arrogant smirk caused Barclay to snort a small laugh, and the tension in his shoulders eased. “All right, then. The first question: why do you dress like that?” Barclay held up his hands before Q could answer. “I mean, I understand why you wear the uniform around the Captain. It obviously upsets him, and you like to ruffle his feathers. But when it’s just you and me, you could wear whatever you like. So why that?” Barclay’s nervous hands gestured broadly at the red Captain’s uniform, pips and all.

“Don’t you think it suits me?” Q replied, standing up without warning and giving Barclay a full-circle spin. He came back to standing face-to-face with the human, hands on his hips and a brow raised in challenge.

Barclay, slowly growing familiar with Q’s moods and ways, ignored the pomposity and the sharp edge of the entity’s tone; he didn’t really mean it, so Barclay wasn’t afraid. Even so, a little ego-stroking never hurt. “It suits you very much. But that can’t be the only reason why. I’ve seen you wear other things, when we’re in a game. Many things suit you.” Barclay paused, going rather still as color flooded his cheeks. Q wasn’t surprised to hear the stammer, now. “T-that is to say—I don’t mean that—Well you—I--.”

“I get the point,” Q interrupted, throwing himself back onto the couch, one arm bent under his head while the other pulled idly at the pips on his collar. “Almost everyone on board wears the uniform. Your co-workers, your friends. It makes sense, doesn’t it, to wear the common threads? ‘When in Rome,’ as the quaint saying goes. Besides, it’s almost comfortable, once you get used to it.”

Barclay, slowly recovering from his mortification, considered this a moment. Finally, he nodded. “That makes sense.”

“Good. What was question number two?”

Barclay was twitching again. Now it was his turn to jump to his feet, but where Q had posed and strutted, the officer paced, rubbing his hands together in a repetitive, self-soothing gesture. “It just occurred to me when you asked what my question was. I’ve thought about it before, of course, but it never seemed right to ask, and of course you don’t have to answer, if you don’t want to, though I guess you probably know that, already, because God knows you rarely answer direct questions if you can help it as it is and--.”

“Lieutenant, please. I may be an all-powerful, immortal being, but at the very least you might try spitting it out before _you_ die of old age.”

Barclay stopped pacing and heaved a deep breath in and out before asking his question in one big, apologetic rush, “If you’re omnipotent and omniscient, don’t you already know what I’m going to ask before I ask it? Or say before I say it? Or do before I do it? It just seems like you don’t know as much as you should know, seeing as you claim to know, well, everything.”

Q sat up on the edge of the couch and stared at Barclay a moment. “That’s the first time any human’s ever come out and asked the question, you know. You all wonder, you all _want_ to know, but no one has ever asked. Not even Picard.”

Barclay swallowed and sat--slowly, as if he expected Q might lunge at any sudden movements—and swallowed a few times. “I thought it might upset you.”

“No. I’m not upset. It’s a respectable question, in fact. I’m sure it’s very difficult for your short-sighted, limited species to begin to comprehend the way the mind of a Q really works. It’s only fair that you’re curious.”

For a moment, Barclay had that look in his eye—that small glimmer of irritated impatience he sometimes showed when he was either too past caring or too stubbornly determined to be afraid. The look lasted only a moment, however, and then his eyes shifted to the side. “You really don’t have to answer,” he told the floor.

Q rolled his eyes and huffed softly. “I’m not evading the question. I don’t mind answering, if you want to know. I just don’t have the right words. It’s not like I can explain this to you the same way I might explain, say, the tenants of a multi-dimensional universe. You have the jargon for that, and a foundation of the scientific principles, juvenile and simple as it might be. There are no words in any mortal language that properly encompasses how Q see, think, and feel.”

Barclay frowned a little, clearly not appeased with the answer. Q wasn’t surprised; he’d been around the mortals of the Enterprise long enough, now, to recognize that the overall curiosity of Starfleet was a force all its own—the crew of this ship wouldn’t be charting the unknown (to them) depths of space at all if not for the sheer, all-encompassing power of that fierce drive to _know._ “I guess that’s that, then,” the officer conceded, shrugging. He leaned over the arm of his chair, reaching for the PADD he’d put aside when the conversation first began.

Q panicked—even Andorian erotica wasn’t as diverting as the ever-shifting landscape of Reginald Barclay’s face, or the nervous-but-forthright nature of his spoken thoughts; if they fell into another half hour of quiet reading, Q would lose his mind (and for a mind as big and complex as his, that was really saying something). “I suppose I could try to explain it with a few visual aids.”

Barclay paused in his reaching and settled back into his chair, broadcasting pure surprise in his wide eyes and raised brows. Q felt a curl of self-satisfaction, always pleased to be the catalyst for that particular expression on the man’s face. “Oh. Well, if you think it’d be worth trying. I can’t promise I’ll understand it all, but I do appreciate the, uh, the effort.”

Q hummed in reply, already raising his hands and pulled at the walls of reality to form the images he desired into the air between them. “Typical mortal consciousness is one-dimensional, at best,” he began, demonstrating this statement with a flat plane of solid color in the general shape of a square. “The consciousness of the Q is layered, and every individual’s consciousness is interwoven into the Continuum.” Here, the flat square was joined with dozens and dozens of other, similar squares laid out one on top of the other with a little bit of space between. The stacked planes multiplied, forming several towers, and each tower’s squares were run through with a series of thin, yarn-like strings, all in a variety of interesting colors. The threads spanned every planed square of each stack and also diverted, from time to time, to pass through a few square pieces on a neighboring stack. This occurred so many times that soon the towers of consciousness were fully intertwined with all of the other towers, making it impossible for Barclay to distinguish where the threads began and ended. “Each layer of consciousness that I possess works both independently and in connection with the rest of my thoughts, as needed.”

“You can follow multiple thought patterns at once, then,” Barclay broke in, speaking slowly, unsure of himself. “Like Data—he can perform multiple functions at one time, like solving a series of equations for better warp core production while also having a conversation with Geordi and running a self-diagnostic and a series of other things.”

“Close enough,” Q said, “Except where our android friend is working through mental problems and internal thoughts on multiple levels, Q use their layers of consciousness in manners both internal and external. At this moment, for example, I am presenting myself in a humanoid form in your quarters and engaging in conversation with you. I am also in something closer to my true form with the rest of the Continuum, having a rather inane argument with one of my fellow Q. I’m also poking around a little with a side project of mine—nothing to worry about, just an uninhabited star system I put together one day when I was exceptionally bored—and hovering around in another quadrant all together, absorbing some very droll culture in the form of a Bajoran musical festival. There are a few other things I am doing, saying, and thinking, right now, but those are all the interesting ones—and the ones that I can best express to you in Standard without resorting to yet more abstract visuals and paltry analogies.”

Barclay’s jaw seemed to be a bit loose. The man gawped, eyes extra wide. “…That’s…a lot,” he finally managed, squeaking a bit before clearing his throat.

“That is, of course, just what _I_ am doing, myself, alone. I am also doing as my fellow Q are doing.”

Barclay leaned forward a little, still appearing a bit stunned, and idly poked at one of the trailing, colorful strings that ran from one stacked tower (one individual Q) to another. “Your consciousness is shared. Like the Borg?”

Q made a face, clearly not appreciating the association. “We’re not a hive-mind. A Q can share or hide consciousness from their fellow Q as much as it pleases them—though it isn’t recommended that any one Q be too secretive or too caviler. It’s a balancing act, to be sure, but most of us figure it out after the first few eons of self-awareness.”

Barclay opened his mouth, clearly about to follow that intriguing statement down a whole new rabbit hole, but he gave it up pretty quickly, determining that it would be best to leave some stories for another day. “I understand. At least, I understand about as well as I’m probably ever going to be able to.”

Q smiled. Barclay was never afraid to admit to his own limitations, or to the limitations of humanity in general. It was a refreshing change from most of the other members of Starfleet whom Q knew best. A certain Captain, for example, would have certainly attempted to push the issue, denying his own sheer inability to really understand until his final breath. (There was something to be said for that kind of dogged tenacity, too, of course, but overall Q found he preferred the former.)

Barclay prodded one of the illusionary threads again. The thread wasn’t very substantial, being mostly pulled out of thin air, but that didn’t stop the man from trying to interact with it as if it were a holodeck image. “I still don’t understand what this has to do with your level of omniscience,” he said. He had that drawn, thoughtful look about him, the kind of look he often had when dealing with an especially puzzling problem in Engineering. Q liked that look, and he especially liked having it directed at him.

“I am as all-knowing as it is possible to be in this universe,” Q explained, slowly. He wasn’t exactly pleased to be telling all of his secrets. He felt a bit like a magician giving away his act—was it possible that explaining how the trick was done would remove some of the mystique? And, if so, would Barclay’s interest wane? Q was only glad that he knew, without a doubt, that the man wouldn’t go blabbing to anyone else on board—if he had to bare his soul (metaphorically speaking, of course), better it be just one individual, and one he was no longer hesitant to call friend, besides.

Barclay jerked a little in his seat and set his full attention on Q. Barclay’s face was the picture of discovery, his eyes bright, a wide, unselfconscious smile on his face—he appeared about two seconds from shouting “eureka!” He didn’t shout, however. He just clasped his hands together tightly between his knees and said, in a voice hushed with wonder, “You can use the shared consciousness of the other Q to learn, no, to, to see. To. Ah. Experience? You are omnipresent and omniscient because you are, ah, are part of a larger whole. But also you’re limited, as an individual, because not even all of the Q can be everywhere at once.”

“I severely underestimated you. It’s amazing what a simple visual aid can do for the limited human mind. I really must keep that in mind the next time I have to deal with Picard.”

Barclay ignored that, still lost in the moment of discovery and (limited, but good enough) understanding. “You do still know somethings that can’t be explained by, ah, uhm…collaborative? Combined? Communal. Communal, ah, experience. I’ve seen you, sometimes, correctly postulate the outcome of a future event, for example. I understanding that some members of the Continuum may be working outside of time as mortals comprehend it, but it seems unlikely that you would pull specific insights like that from your fellow Q.”

Q shrugged. “That’s not so impressive, really. You may have forgotten, but I happen to have a very high IQ. When you’re obscenely intelligent, it isn’t so difficult to recognize patterns and determine the course of events. The future is full of many possibilities, but they aren’t actually infinite.”

“So, if I ask you if I can ask you a question…”

“It could be any number of things. I can probably track some of your thought patterns—human thinking is so linear and really very straight-forward—but that kind of logical deduction isn’t foolproof. And it isn’t very fun, either. What’s the point of my bothering to talk to you at all if I know what you’re going to say before you say it?”

Barclay blinked, pulling away from his intellectual excitement. He had that wide-eyed look of surprise again, fully directed on Q once more. “You…you have fun, talking to me?”

Q snorted, derisive as he could be (which was very derisive, indeed). “Of course I do. Didn’t you know?”

“Not really,” Barclay admitted, sheepish. “I’ve never really been sure why you’d want to hang around.”

Q sighed deeply and bent back over the arm of the couch to retrieve his wayward PADD. “You are being tiresome and ridiculous,” he informed the other man, “So I am going to ignore you, now.”

“O-oh,” Barclay replied, blinking a little in confusion before scrambling for his own reading. “Ah. Well. That’s understandable. Thank you for, uh, answering my questions.”

“Hmm.”

“Q?”

Q didn’t allow his eyes to stray from the text on his screen, but he did tilt his head a little to the side, the better to hear Barclay’s bluster. “Hmm?”

“You would look even better, I think, in Science blues. You, you should—could, you could—try it, sometime. If you wanted.”

Q scrolled to the next page, tapping his fingertips on an especially explicit section of the text and applying the highlight feature—the better for Barclay to notice it, later. “I’ll keep that in mind,” he said, magnanimously, and he didn’t even mind all that much as they both fell into silent reading once more.


End file.
